Reflex Linking Taste And Muscle Activity Discovered

Swirling around carbohydrate solution in your mouth can make you feel stronger, even before it reaches the bloodstream, the muscle strength going up by a significant two per cent.

Reflex Linking Taste And Muscle Activity Discovered

New Zealand researchers seem to have discovered a previously unknown neural pathway that is activated when receptors in the mouth detect carbohydrate. The very presence in the mouth stimulates parts of the brain that control muscle activity and producing an increase in muscle strength, they said.

The discovery could new vistas in sports medicine, on toning up fatigued muscles.

Previous research had shown that the presence of carbohydrate in the mouth can improve physical performance during prolonged activity, but the mechanism involved was not known and it was unclear whether a person must be fatigued for the effect to be seen.

"There appears to be a pathway in the brain that tells our muscles when energy is on the way," says lead researcher Dr Nicholas Gant from the Department of Sport and Exercise Science, University of Auckland.

"We have shown that carbohydrate in the mouth produces an immediate increase in neural drive to both fresh and fatigued muscle and that the size of the effect is unrelated to the amount of glucose in the blood or the extent of fatigue."

The current research has been published in the journal Brain Research and has also captured the attention of New Scientist magazine.

In the first of two experiments, 16 healthy young men who had been doing biceps exercises for 11 minutes were given a carbohydrate solution to drink or an identically flavored energy-free placebo. Their biceps strength was measured before and immediately afterward, as was the activity of the brain pathway known to supply the biceps.

Around one second after swallowing the drink, neural activity increased by 30 percent and muscle strength two percent, with the effect lasting for around three minutes. The response was not related to the amount of glucose in the bloodstream or how fatigued the participants were.

"It might not sound like much, but a two percent increase in muscle strength is enormous, especially at the elite level. It's the difference between winning an Olympic medal or not," says co-author Dr Cathy Stinear.

As might be expected, a second boost in muscle strength was observed after 10 minutes when carbohydrate reached the bloodstream and muscles through digestion, but no additional boost in neural activity was seen at that time.

"Two quite distinct mechanisms are involved," says Dr Stinear. "The first is the signal from the mouth via the brain that energy is about to be available and the second is when the carbohydrate actually reaches the muscles and provides that energy," says Dr Stinear.

"The carbohydrate and placebo solutions used in the experiment were of identical flavour and sweetness, confirming that receptors in the mouth can process other sensory information aside from the basic taste qualities of food. The results suggest that detecting energy may be a sixth taste sense in humans," says Dr Gant.

In the second experiment, 17 participants who had not been doing exercise and were not fatigued simply held one of the solutions in their mouths without swallowing. Measurements of the muscle between the thumb and index finger were taken while the muscle was either relaxed or active.

A similar, though smaller effect was observed as in the first experiment, with a nine percent increase in neural activity produced by the carbohydrate solution compared with placebo. This showed that the response is seen in both large powerful muscles and in smaller muscles responsible for fine hand movements.

"Together the results show that carbohydrate in the mouth activates the neural pathway whether or not muscles are fatigued. We were surprised by this, because we had expected that the response would be part of the brain's sophisticated system for monitoring energy levels during exercise," says Dr Stinear.

"Seeing the same effect in fresh muscle suggests that it's more of a simple reflex - part of our basic wiring - and it appears that very ancient parts of the brain such as the brainstem are involved. Reflexive movements in response to touch, vision and hearing are well known but this is the first time that a reflex linking taste and muscle activity has been described," she says.

Further research is required to determine the precise mechanisms involved and to learn more about the size of the effect on fresh versus fatigued muscle.

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